


The Barefooted Ghost

by BeyondStarlight



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Ghosts, M/M, Rating might go up, arguable character death, yuuri lives with his grandma not his parents
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-24
Updated: 2017-02-11
Packaged: 2018-09-19 17:43:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9452765
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BeyondStarlight/pseuds/BeyondStarlight
Summary: Hasetsu is a peculiar little town, where a peculiar young man meets the spirit who resides by the lake. Every winter, rumours go around – of people who are lured onto the ice and never return. This is the story of the Barefooted Ghost.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> (This story was not beta-readed, and I am not a native English speaker. Please let me know if you see any errors. Enjoy!)

_February 7 th, 1893. Russia’s beloved skater Viktor Nikiforov takes a sudden break from his career. The newspapers are heavy with rumours. “He needs air,” his coach (Yakov Feltsman) reports. What for and for how long remains undisclosed. One month passes. Viktor is glimpsed in China – the rest of the world receives a grainy picture of an expressionless man sitting on a bridge, alone. Several weeks later, a local journalist walks in on him in Vietnam. There are no pictures, but there is a story of a camera being smashed, and vulgarities that are understood universally by tone alone. This event is quickly followed by the brief reappearance and apologies of coach Feltsman, and the ever handsome and charming Viktor himself. Promises are made for the upcoming skating season. May 18th, Viktor Nikiforov goes missing. All search actions are in vain. He is never seen again._


	2. Warning Signs

“Can you sense it too?”

Yuri nearly drops his phone. His grandmother always had a knack for moving quietly. She doesn’t look at him, but stares at a crow, which stares back. He is not sure if she is speaking to him, or the crow.

“There’s a storm coming.” She turns to him then, and the crow takes off; dismissed.

The air is thin and motionless, and the mist that slowly creeps over the lands is almost solid. Even in April, the aftermath of winter clings to the houses and the trees and the furs of sleeping animals, reluctant to leave. Yuri closes his eyes, tasting ice with every breath, and waits.

“I can’t feel it.”

She smiles, absent-mindedly running her thumb over the hem of her shirt. When she speaks, her voice seems to come from far away. “Listen to the birds, boy. They know more than we do.”

Her eyes peer into the woods again, as though she can spy all the birds out there. Perhaps there are birds eavesdropping on them right now – he wouldn’t know.

“Why birds?”

He never dared to ask. Thought it was impolite. He feels oddly bold lately. Maybe it’s the storm. Or maybe it’s part of growing up, like Mari always says.

“They are the eyes, skimming over the treetops and peeking in through the windows. They see, they know, but they do not understand.” A thin smile, almost a smirk, curves her lips. She looks younger like this, with a glint in her eyes and mischief on her mind, but the moment passes and then she is old and soft again. “Except for the crows,” she mutters, “Clever creatures, they are, and anything that is clever enough to understand is clever enough to lie. Beware of the crows.”

He pauses, worrying his bottom lip. Love and loyalty for her have caused him to always believe her, but lately, he wonders whether Mari and the others are right.

“They said the weather was going to be nice.” When she frowns, he adds, “You said something about a storm.”

She laughs sharply. A startled lark flutters away.

“The weather? Oh, my dearest boy, if only the weather were our biggest concern.”

Her words linger in his mind like smoke. He never understood the world like she did. Sometimes he thinks the two of them live in separate worlds, which just happened to look very, very similar. “You don’t mind that I eat at Yuko’s place tonight, do you?”

“Not at all, not at all” she muses. She checks her watch, and holds his arms gently. It’s twenty past seven. They watch until the minute passes. It’s the magic minute, according to her. Odd things happen at twenty past, she says.

He puts his phone away, and she pulls his hat over his head. “I’ll be back before eleven, and I won’t speak with crows.”

“Better not, or I’ll know!” She chuckles. “Enjoy yourself. Tell them I said hi.”

He nods and waves her goodbye.

“Goodnight,” he says.

“Beware,” she says.

* * *

 

The evening passes pleasantly. They open the ice rink just for the three of them – Yuko, her husband, and Yuri himself. Most of winter, he skates outside, on the lake. He always forgets how odd it is to skate inside after so long. It’s small, and everything is perfectly smooth, and he expects cracks and discoloured patches where there are none. It’s dizzying, at first. The walls close in on him after every jump and turn and fall. He gets used to it, after a while. And soon, the rink resounds with their laughter.

He loses track of time. It happens. It’s a bit past eleven when he realises he should have been home by now. Grandmother is still up, waiting for him – and the storm, she was worried about a storm. He apologises and leaves in a rush, sparing a quick look at the clock out of habit. It’s twenty past eleven. He halts.

“Something wrong, Yuri?” Yuko glances at him as he stands in the opening of the door, the cold night breezing into the house.

“No, nothing.”

* * *

 

The streets are deserted, as they are during most of the day. At night, however, the emptiness becomes palpable. When he reaches the lake, everything has grown quiet. Deafeningly quiet. The night holds its breath, so that even the treetops still around him. Only his footsteps are audible, amplified by the silence. The paths he walked so many times feel unfamiliar. He knows he walked here, on this very path, but for some reason he can’t remember any one of those times. Still, he doesn’t stop, and doesn’t look behind him. The silence is so heavy it smothers his fears and doubts and any other thoughts. Maybe he is dreaming, he thinks, and he thinks no more of it.

“Are you lost?”

He is not surprised by the voice. It sounds as natural as the wind and the rustle of leaves, even if there is no wind and no leaves are rustling. He doesn’t look aside, at the man walking next to him. Something else is off, but he can’t pinpoint it.

“No.”

They walk in silence. There are no more trees separating him from the lake, and even the bushes have grown thin and scarce. The moon hangs low above the ice, much bigger and much brighter than Yuri can remember it. He slows down.

“I have seen you before,” the man says – he has a strong, foreign accent. His footsteps, they make no sound. That’s the odd thing he couldn’t tell earlier. “But not on my path.”

“This is not your path.”

His voice sounds too loud and too harsh. He can hear it grit against the air around them. He feels denser, more present, than anything around him. Home, he thinks, and he knows he mustn’t slow down. He tries to hasten his steps but, like in dreams, everything has its own pace, and running is just as slow as a leisurely stroll.

“I’m glad you came to visit,” the man continues, paying no attention to Yuri’s words. “I saw you skating on the ice a few times, but I suppose you won’t be around anymore until autumn. That’s a pity. It gets very lonely around here.”

The stranger has a nice voice; cool and soft and low. His words resonate through Yuri’s head a few times before he attempts to discern any meaning.

“You don’t know me,” he says, quietly. “And I didn’t come to visit you.”

“Of course.” The man chuckles. “Well, take care, Yuri. They say a storm is coming, and I wouldn’t want you to get hurt.”

* * *

 

Yuri is standing in front of his house, unsure of how he got back. The night is howling once again, and suddenly the cold seizes him with violent shivers and teeth clattering.

His grandmother opens the door. As he steps over the doorstep, he can feel time slowing down. His body grows heavier as every fraction of a second is dragged out. When he blinks, the feeling has passed. “Foolish boy,” his grandmother mutters, shaking her head and ushering him in. He glances over his grandmother’s head to see the old clock. Twenty past eleven.


	3. Break Through

Hasetsu, May 1893.

Nobody knows this place. Nobody even heard of it. The people who live in Hasetsu are the only ones aware of its existence. Maps don’t carry its name and neighbouring villages don’t carry any memories of it.

“It’s perfect.”

Yakov rests his big, calloused hand on Viktor’s shoulder, and squeezes him lightly. A thought flutters by – it’s been a few years since they were so relaxed around each other – but it passes before Viktor can think any more of it. The two of them walk through the streets, no one paying them any mind.

It’s freezing in the north of Japan. There is nothing odd about that, in itself – what Viktor finds odd is that he notices. Being born and raised in the cold, it became part of his everyday life, and yet here, the cold is more present. Maybe it’s the country – smaller, almost tighter and heavier; a world of its own pressed into a sliver of land. Or the people – they live faster, and busier, he thinks. Their eyes are always moving, as if they’re looking for something; or maybe they’re seeing more. A part of him thinks it’s this town in particular. Hasetsu.

Yakov brings him to his room, they talk about nothing and Viktor toes off his shoes. There are no shot glasses, so Viktor pours them a lemonade glass of vodka. Yakov toasts to a promising future, and the burn in their throats seals it. They almost pour a second glass purely out of politeness, but Yakov is already halfway out the door and Viktor halfway undressed. For a lingering moment, Yakov pauses and glances at him, mouth tight and eyes hard. Then his shoulders mouth sags and he shakes his head.

At last, there is the soft click of the door that finally separates Viktor from the rest of the world. The only sound he can hear now is the howling of the wind; a low, humming sound. It thrums through his head, filling it like cotton. He falls asleep faster and heavier than ever.

He can’t remember the last time he had such a deep, dreamless sleep. The bed is warm and the blankets smell of a home – not his home, but a home nonetheless. There are clean clothes waiting for him in the bathroom, and he briefly wonders from whom they come. He peels off his clothes, which are crooked and smell of sweat. When he glances in the mirror, running his hand through his hair, his reflection moves slower, almost hesitating. He blinks and rubs his eyes, side-eying the half-empty bottle of vodka left on the table.

 

* * *

 

He got lost, again. Hasetsu, despite being tiny and unimpressive as a whole, seems to endlessly expand inwards. There is a lake, not far from where he is, and though he knows he should go back to meet Yakov in the local bar, he can’t bring himself to return. A thick layer of ice has settled on the lake, and for a painfully short moment he almost feels a flicker of excitement. The weight of his old skates, which he faithfully carries in his bag, seems to grow heavier with each step he makes towards the lake. The low humming of the wind is louder here, and almost closer, as if it’s humming inside his own head.

“Hello, young man. Are you lost?”

He is not startled by the voice, although he knows not where it came from. It’s low and melodic, as if it’s carried by the wind. A lady is standing next to him, as if she had been all along.

“No,” he says, staring at the bare wedding ring she wears on her necklace. His mouth is dry and his head oddly light. “I found just whom I was looking for.”

She looks different from how he remembers her. There is soil underneath her nails her cheeks and nose are red with cold. She smiles and wipes her running nose with the back of her hand. He never saw her smile like that. His chest grows tight and he looks away.

“I’ve been expecting you.”

“I know we made a deal, but I need you to reverse it.” He manages to sound calm about it, swallowing down the rush of memories from the past few months, wasted in fruitless search.

“I’m afraid it’s not that easy.”

“You have to try,” he takes her hand, small and warm and calloused, in his. “I can’t live like this.”

She cups his cheek with her other hand, and stares hard into his eyes. “You greedy, vain boy,” she says, quietly. “You asked me for fame, for glory, and I listened. I made you the best figure skater in the world. I put you in the eyes and hearts of people, and if they could not love you, they envied you. I have written down your name in the books of history.” Her nails dig into his cheek, but he can’t move. “And now you come cry to me, because you finally feel the weight of the price you payed.”

“Please,” he breathes, and the word leaves a white cloud lingering between them. Her fingers relax, and she runs her thumb over his cheek. "I'll give you anything you want in return.”

 

* * *

 

A man stand in the middle of the lake.

He is but a silhouette in the deep red sun that seems to have frozen over the horizon, and draws his long, dark shadow across the lake. The ice is dark, almost smooth, and below it, the lake still sways ever so slowly.

Though he has left his coat and scarf behind on the land, the cold of Hasetsu does not reach him anymore. He stares at the first stars of the night, and smiles. He moves, slowly at first, as if he is skating on ice for the first time. With every round and every gesture, he grows more gracious and grand and joyful. The mere force of his joy spins him around in circles, and circles within circles. The thrum of it races through his veins, and he moves faster, and faster, until he is nothing but a body that moves on its own.

He catches on a ripple in the ice. His hands hit the surface first, fingers crunching for an unpleasant moment before the ice gives in. His face hits the jagged edge of the crack. For a moment, he lies frozen, unable to move or think, with his face down and his arms caught in the water. He thinks he can hear the lake exhale, hear the ice bending slowly, ever so slowly, underneath him. He raises his head, chocking and gasping. A bright red gash runs through his forehead and eyebrow. He doesn’t feel the hot blood rushing down his face, into his mouth and down his chin. He spits and he gasps and he tastes the dirt of the lake and the rust of his blood. His fingers are clawing at the edge of the opening. He can see the red fingerprints but it doesn’t register. _Out_ , the thinks. _Out. Out. Out_. _God please let me out._

For a moment he feels nothing – nothing but the weight of the lake shifting. Another exhale. _Out. Out. Out_. His knees are already sinking again and- _crack_.

The water is black. It holds him everywhere and takes everything of him. It takes his kicking and his clawing and his screaming. It takes tears and blood and breath until they’re all part of the water. Until he is left twitching and jerking. He can feel the swaying of the lake. The slow deep inhale of the water as it absorbs him. One last time, he raises his head to the surface, catching the flickering light that breaks through. A voice wraps around his head, or maybe it comes from within himself. "You greedy, vain boy," it sighs, and then everything goes black.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Please leave a comment, even a short one. It makes my day :)


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